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his bed-room door. On awakening one morning, he found the dog dead, on which he exclaimed, in allusion to the gipsy's prophecy, which he had previously heard, "The kingdom is departed from me.' Cromwell died soon after, and the subsequent events are sufficiently known."

In 1647 the ill-fated Charles was brought hither by the army from Holmby, in Northamptonshire. Whilst here he was treated with respect, and even kindness, being allowed also the melancholy satis

In 1606 the king and queen gave here a splendid series of entertainments, extending over a fortnight, to Francis, Prince of Vaudemois, son of the Duke of Lorraine, and to a large company of noblemen and gentlemen. Here, in 1618, died the queen of James, Anne of Denmark.

Charles I. resided at Hampton Court both in his happiest and most melancholy days. Like Philip and Mary, his Majesty and his queen, Henrietta Maria, daughter of Henry IV. of France, came here in 1625 to spend their honeymoon. On summer evenings he and the queen and the rest of the court, would "take barge" on the Thames and amuse their leisure hours by feeding the swans. Laud was appointed Dean of the Chapel of Hampton Court in 1626, soon after his translation to Bath and Wells; but his memory is associated less with Hampton than with Lambeth Palace.

In 1641 King Charles took refuge at Hampton Court during the troubles in London. It is related that "one day whilst his Majesty was standing at one of the windows of the palace, surrounded by his children, a gipsy or beggar-woman came up to it, and asked for charity. Her appearance excited ridicule and probably threats, which so enraged the gipsy that she took out of her basket a lookingglass, and presented it to the king; he saw in it his own head decollated. Probably with a natural wish to conciliate so prophetical a beggar, or for some other reason, money was given to her. She then said that the death of a dog in a room the king was then in would precede the restoration to his family of the kingdom which the king was then about to lose. It is said that Oliver Cromwell afterwards slept in the room referred to. He was constantly attended by a faithful dog, who guarded

favour of the Earl of Northumberland. His Majesty was kept here, not actually in imprisonment, but under restraint, by the Parliament and the army from the 24th of August down to the 11th of November, when he escaped. Great had been the change in his circumstances during those few months-the generals, who had been hopeful that they might come to an arrangement with the king, found that he was only playing with them to gain time, and carry his own schemes. The Scotch Commissioners could do nothing with him; and, alarmed by rumours that in the ranks of the soldiery were men who would not scruple to assassinate him, Charles departed, to put himself in a worse condition in the Isle of Wight.

We find in the "Diary" of John Evelyn, under date of October 10th, 1647, the following entry:—“I came to Hampton Court, where I had the honour to kisse his Majesty's hand, he being now in the power of those execrable villains who not long after murder'd him."

In 1651 the Parliament sold the whole of the estate of Hampton Court to a Mr. John Phelpe, a member of the Lower House, for the sum of £10,765 19s. 6d. ; but in 1656, Oliver Cromwell, enriched by the wreck of the State, again acquired possession of the palace, for which he appears to have had a special liking, and made it one of his principal places of residence. The marriage ceremony of his daughter Elizabeth, who espoused Lord Falconberg, was here celebrated in 1657;* and in the following year the Lord Protector's favourite daughter, Mrs. Claypole (who is said to have severely remonstrated with him, in her last hours, on the subject of his dangerous ambition), here breathed her last. Hither Oliver Cromwell would repair, when Lord Protector of the Realm, to dine with his officers. Mr. Secretary Thurloe thus records the fact in sundry minutes in his pocketbook, given by John Milton to his nephew, Mr. John Philips :-"Sometimes, as the fit takes him, to divert the melancholy, he dines with the officers of his army at Hampton Court, and shows a hundred antic tricks, as throwing cushions at them, and

putting hot coals into their pockets and boots! At others, before he has half dined, he gives orders for a drum to beat and call in his foot-guards, like a kennel of hounds, to snatch off the meat from his table and tear it in pieces, with many other unaccountable whimsies; immediately after this, fear and astonishment sit in his countenance, and not a nobleman approaches him but he fells him! Now he calls for his guards, with whom he rides out, encompassed behind and before, for the preservation of his Highness, and at his return at night, shifts from bed to bed for fear of surprise." Once, we read, he narrowly escaped assassination while riding through the narrow part of Hammersmith, on his way to this pleasant London suburb. George Fox, the Quaker, in his "Chronicles," relates how he went out on a day in 1658 to protest to Cromwell against the severities inflicted on the eccentric members of his persuasion, and meeting the Protector riding in Hampton Park at the head of his life-guard, Fox said what he believed he was inspired to say, and withdrawing, felt a "waft of death" go out against the Protector. Nor was it many days afterwards that, on the advice of his physicians, Cromwell left Hampton Court for Whitehall, the place of his decease on September 3rd, 1658.

In an article in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1877, entitled "Oliver Cromwell at Hampton Court," are published some details of an "Inventory of Goods and Servants at Hampton Court," taken by order of the House of Commons, in June, 1659. This interesting document is preserved in the State Paper Office, among the uncalendared papers of that period. The reason for taking the inventory is set forth in a kind of preamble, "so as there be not embezzlement of" the goods. "In looking over the inventory," observes the writer of the article in question, "it is curious to note that only four looking-glasses are mentioned. This could not have arisen from any scarcity of that article at the period, because in the celebrated inventories of the palaces of Henry VIII. there are fourteen mentioned and fully described. The first mentioned in Hampton Court was in the rich bed-chamber,' and is thus described: one large looking-glass in an ebony frame.' Then in the lower wardrobe' were 'two small looking-glasses, one of them being broke.' The fourth hung in a room which, in the time of Charles I., was occupied by the Bishop of Canterbury, and during Cromwell's Protectorate was used by his daughter, Mrs. Claypole, as a nursery. The description is as follows: 'One large looking-glass in an ebony frame, with a string of silk and gold.' The absence of any

further reference to looking-glasses is rather suggestive. Perhaps Oliver Cromwell objected to them on principle, as leading to vanity; or possibly such as were in use were regarded as personal property, and the owners carried them away when they left the place. Hampton Court has been greatly altered since Cromwell's time, and there is not one chamber which is now associated with his memory. The Great Hall, of course, remains, in which were two organs the larger one a gift from Cromwell's friend, Dr. Goodwin, President of Magdalen College, Oxford; but the hall is more closely associated with the grand entertainments given by Wolsey, and the revels of Henry VIII., than with Cromwell. In like manner the chapel is only in a general way associated with his memory. More interesting reminiscences will occur in the Mantegna Gallery,' as it is called, after the painter of a series of pictures now hung in it. In Cromwell's time this was called the 'Long Gallery.' The pictures, nine in number, and of gigantic size, formed at one time part of a collection belonging to the Marquis of Mantua, the whole of which Charles I. purchased, at a cost of £80,000. They represent the triumphs of Julius Cæsar, and were painted by Andrea Mantegna. Cromwell

must have looked upon these grand pictures every time he strode along the gallery. They seem now to identify themselves with his spirit, and to depict the ideal triumphs that he would fain have won for England."

After the death of Cromwell it was thought undesirable to allow the palace to be stripped, in anticipation of the arrival of Charles II. Charles, apparently forgetful of his royal parent's misery, often enjoyed the song and dance of revelry in this palace.

At Hampton Court he spent a large part of his time both before and after his marriage with Catharine of Braganza. For a king to aspire to "happiness" is a pretension beyond his condition of life. It suited Lady Castlemaine as little that Charles should be "well acquainted" with his youthful bride as it suited the courtiers that he should think himself happy in wedlock. Before the royal party arrived at Hampton Court for the enjoyment of the honeymoon, mischief had been at work; and though the month was May (a season that seems expressly created by nature for honeymoons) breezes were blowing more boisterous than the turbulent equinox. Still, strangely enough, Hampton Court, in the hours of her after life, was a spot ever dear to Catharine of Braganza, on account of its memory of the transient dream of happiness connected with her honeymoon.

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and southern fronts. It is from the Fountain Court that the State Apartments are reached by a staircase, which was painted by Verrio, a man who regarded William as an usurper, which led Lord Orford to make the satirical remark that this artist painted the staircase as badly as if he had spoilt it out of principle.

Here, deserted by the servile tribe of flatterers, an object of pity to some, of contempt perhaps to more, Catharine was obliged to look on tamely, and see the homage of the courtiers paid before her face to other "stars," while she was abandoned and desolate in a foreign country; her only chance of winning even decent courtesy of her profligate husband depended on the degree of patience which she could exhibit.

James II. occasionally visited Hampton Court palace, and at times held his councils there. A good story is told about the poet Waller and King James. His Majesty treated Waller with great familiarity, and one day took him into the royal closet, and asked him how he liked one of the pictures, at the same time pointing to a lady's portrait. "My eyes, sir, are dim," answered Waller, "and I cannot distinguish it." "It is the Princess of Orange," said the king. "She is like the greatest woman in the world, sir," answered Waller; and on the king asking whom he meant, he answered again, "Queen Elizabeth." "I wonder," said his Majesty, "that you should think so; but I must confess she had a wise council." “And, sir,” asked Waller in return, "did you ever know a fool choose a wise council ?"

William III. and his queen appear to have preferred this palace to all their other residences. Specimens of the beautiful embroidery of her Majesty and her female attendants might at one time be seen here.

Many persons were angry because "Dutch William " tried to improve upon a structure which had been good enough for the many royal personages who had preceded him; but it was not his habit to study public opinion. Sir Christopher Wren pulled down various portions of the old palace, leaving untouched, however, the entrance court, and only so far altering the middle quadrangle as to introduce, with bad tiste, an Ionic

Mr. J. T. Smith, in his work above quoted, observes :-"King William III., who took every opportunity of rendering these apartments as pleasing to him as those he had left in 'the house in the Wood,' introduced nothing by way of porcelain, beyond that of delf, and on that ware, in many instances, his Majesty had 'W.R.,' surmounted by the crown of England, painted on the fronts. Of the various specimens of this clumsy blue-andwhite delf, displayed in the numerous rooms of this once magnificent palace, the pride of Wolsey and splendour of Henry VIII., the eight large pots for the reception of King William III.'s orangetree, now standing in her Majesty's gallery, certainly have claims to future protection. As for the old and ragged bed-furniture, it is so disgraceful to a palace, that, antiquarian as I in some degree consider myself, I most heartily wish it in Petticoat Lane."

John Evelyn was again at Hampton Court shortly after William III. ascended the throne, for under date of July 16th, 1689, he writes in his "Diary":"I went to Hampton Court about buisinesse, the Council being there. A greate apartment and spacious garden with fountaines was beginning in the park, at the head of the canal.”

It was in the park that the king met with the accident that caused his death. Macaulay writes :— "On the 20th of February, 1702, William was ambling on a favourite horse, named Sorrel, through the park of Hampton Court. He urged his horse to strike into a gallop just at the spot where a mole had been at work. Sorrel stumbled on the molehill, and went down on his knees. The king fell off and broke his collar-bone. The bone was set, and he returned to Kensington in his coach, but the jolting of the rough roads of that time made it necessary to reduce the fracture again." It is not to be wondered at that William never recovered this double shock to his system, and that fever supervening, he died a few days subsequently.

The sister of Queen Mary, then Princess of Denmark, and afterwards Queen Anne, here gave birth on the 24th of July, 1689, to the Duke of Gloucester, who died at eleven years of age, and thus

Here thou, great Anna, whom these realms obey,
Dost sometimes counsel take, and sometimes tea."

Tea, it must be remembered, was a rare article in those days. It had not then been many years introduced into England, for in Pepys's "Diary," under date of September 25th, 1660, we find this entry :-"I did send for a cup of tee (a China drink), of which I had never drank

before."

In the "Rape of the Lock" Belinda is made to exclaim :

"Happy! ah, ten times happy had I been,

If Hampton Court these eyes had never seen!
Yet am I not the first mistaken maid
By love of courts to numerous ills betrayed.

throne, who was the last monarch who made it his residence. The two first Georges, however, were devoid of taste, and illiterate, and that may account for the fact. "It is curious that not one solitary epistle in the handwriting of George II. is This circumstance is more reknown to exist. markable if we refer to his gallantries and intrigues, so severely commented upon and recorded by Walpole and others." Such is the statement of a writer in the columns of the Times.

Miss Chudleigh may be regarded as the ideal and type of the set of pert, or even malapert, young ladies who acted as maids of honour in the courts of the first two Georges. A good story is told by Charles Knight in his "London," which,

whether it be true or false, is at all events characteristic of her transcendent impudence :-Apartments in Hampton Court palace having been allotted to her mother, the king good-naturedly asked Miss Chudleigh one day how the old lady felt in her new abode. "Oh, very well, if the poor woman had only a bed to lie upon !" "That oversight must be repaired," said the king. On this hint, the maid of honour (who continued a maid of honour for twenty years after her clandestine marriage with the Hon. Mr. Hervey, afterwards Earl of Bristol) acted, and in due time there appeared among the royal household accounts, "To a bed and furniture for the apartments of the Hon. Mrs. Chudleigh, £4,000." The king, who, though decidedly fond of money, was a man of his word, paid the bill, but remarked that if Mrs. Chudleigh found the bed as hard as

he did, she would never sleep in it.

For the last century or more apartments in Hampton Court Palace have generally been bestowed on the poorer female members of noble families, or on widows of distinguished generals and admirals who have died in the service of their country. It is not

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request that your lordship will be pleased to grant such rooms in Hampton Court as shall seem proper to, my lord, your lordship's most obedient and most humble servant, SAM. JOHNSON, Bolt Court, Fleet Street, April 11, 1776.' Endorsed, 'Mr. Samuel Johnson to the Earl of Hertford, requesting apartments at Hampton Court, 11 May, 1776.The answer: 'Lord C. presents his compliments to Mr. Johnson, and is sorry that he cannot obey his commands, having already on his hands many engagements unsatisfied.'"

In 1795, William, Prince of Orange, Hereditary Stadtholder of Holland, driven from Holland by the advanced wave of the French Revolution,found here a hospitable asylum; "and here," writes gossiping Sir Nathaniel William Wraxall, "the princes of our royal family and the nation at large vied in demonstrations of respect, compassion, and attention. towards him." It was his son who was at one time designed to be the husband of our Princess Charlotte, but Providence decreed otherwise.

generally known that once at least in his life Dr. Johnson cast a longing eye upon this privileged place. At all events, the following letter was published a few years ago in the Athenæum:"The following interesting letter of Dr. Samuel Johnson has never been in print: My Lord, -Being wholly unknown to your lordship, I have only this apology to make for presuming to trouble you with a request-that a stranger's petition, if it cannot be easily granted, can be easily refused. Some of the apartments are now vacant, in which I am encouraged to hope that, by application to your lordship, I may obtain a residence. Such a grant would be considered by me as a great favour; and I hope, to a man who has had the honour of vindicating his Majesty's government, a retreat in one of his houses may be not improperly or unworthily allowed. I therefore

In 1810, after being deposed from the Swedish throne by the great Napoleon, Gustavus IV. came to England, and occupied a set of apart

ments here. He died in February, 1837.

The favoured inmates of Hampton Court palace during Her Majesty's reign have consisted largely of members of the following families, all of whom are more or less nearly connected with the Peerage:-Paget, Grey, Byng, Capel, Talbot, Ponsonby, Murray, Cathcart, Ward, Swinburne, Crofton, &c. In many cases these persons have been the widows of distinguished officers of the army and navy who have fallen in battle in the service of their country.

Since the year 1839 those parts of the palace which are not occupied by private residents, and the gardens, have been thrown open to the public, and during the summer months the whole place forms daily a great attraction to hundreds of sightseers, both English and foreign, who come to it by road or rail or river.